Power Play - Anne McCaffrey [23]
Braddock gawked at his erstwhile employer.
“You see, Braddock, I am going to set you up in business. The transport business. So that you can travel easily throughout this star system and all others controlled by the company.”
“You are, sir?” Then the light slowly dawned on him. “Ah! So that I can tell others about the planet, sir?”
“That’s it, Braddock. Absolutely correct. You will form a company which will enable you to enable those searching for the nirvana which only Petaybee can provide to reach the planet. A transport company. Now then, I know a thing or two about how people’s minds work, how to discreetly encourage them to do the right thing. Some people we will be able to attract simply by appealing to what interests them. The wealth of animal life on the planet, for instance, should appeal to sportsmen. And of course, there will be financiers hoping to benefit by the company’s necessary withdrawal. We are not playing favorites here. We’ll carry anyone who can pay the fare. But there are others who will want to come because they have relations there, from whom they were separated during the company’s relocation programs following land purchases after the various Terran wars. But many, Braddock, will simply hunger for a greater truth, a higher purpose, than any they have known. They must have a leader they can follow. You, Braddock, will become that leader, but not as Braddock Makem . . .”
Thus the PTS transport company was conceived.
Thus Brother Granite received his name and his instruction in the sort of language to use in bringing the truth about Petaybee to other worlds.
And it was good.
Gal Three—Several days later
This whole CIS thing wasn’t working out the way Diego had thought it would, but he was glad he’d come along anyway, just to keep Bunny’s head straight, if nothing else. Marmie was a nice lady and all that, but he could have done without the niece and nephew. The nephew was way too nice to Bunny, and the niece kept trying to get her to act and dress like shipside girls. Diego liked her the way she was already.
He had looked forward to her reactions to the advanced gadgetry that was part of shipboard life and had imagined her repairing something she hadn’t known existed until then, but every time he started pointing something out, Charmion got bored and suggested going to the fancy gymnasium where Bailey impressed Bunny and depressed Diego, who had never been a jock, with his gymnastic prowess.
And he couldn’t really say anything about it to Bunny. She was like some little kid who’d never seen candy before. He, of course, was already pretty familiar with all this stuff, though neither of his parents had ever inhabited the same lofty circles as Marmion Algemeine. But Bunny, who couldn’t imagine doing anything athletic in less than sixteen layers of down and fur, was easily swayed and tried very hard to learn what Bailey and Charmion had been doing all their lives.
Meanwhile, Marmion and her crew were keeping the colonel entertained and as busy as possible, but Diego could tell that Yana was getting a little antsy when they’d been there a week and the CIS hearing still hadn’t convened. Every day he got up thinking, Today we’ll do what we came here for. Yana will tell them how it is and Bunny will speak for the planet and maybe I’ll sing them my song, and then we’ll go home. He should have known better. His dad was always complaining about how long it took the brass to move on anything significant.
There was one delay after another. Anaciliact was away on another assignment, and Farringer Ball, who represented the company’s interests, had been stricken with a mysterious illness that was sweeping through the upper echelons of the power structure on other stations. Ball normally inhabited Gal Three, but had been away conferring with the leaders of other terraformed colonies when the illness struck.
That was the scuttlebutt, anyway—the details were being kept fairly hush-hush. Not that Diego cared, except for the inconvenience it was causing him. While his father’s recent illness made him